AI-Powered Zero Trust Smart Shopping Mall Security System: A Review and Proposed Framework

Modern Shopping Malls consist of many Payment Terminals, CCTV Cameras, IoT Devices, Cloud Services and Public Wi-Fi. While this provides convenience for the user it introduces many potential entry points making traditional security methods inefficient. By applying real time behavioural analysis to detect anomalies and improve the Zero Trust solution using Artificial Intelligence. This paper looks at seven papers that were published between 2024-2025 on AI anomaly detection, continuous authentication, AI Security Operations Centre, Zero Trust in Smart Cities, Fraud Detection in Payments, Threat Analysis in IoT and Micro-segmentation in IoT. Each study only focuses on one aspect of this area and does not provide security across the entire smart mall. Findings have lead to the development of a multi layered framework to apply AI powered Zero Trust in smart malls. This looks into the applications, benefits and challenges.